Canmore Miners Reunion

Back in the summer we spent an eventful week in the attractive town of Canmore, which lies just outside the Banff National Park. It seems that while building and planning regulations are very strict within the parks, there is a lot more scope for all kinds of development once outside their boundaries. 

For the majority of its existence, Canmore was a mining town. Locals were keen to tell us that the mines were the reason Canmore existed, and around which life was based there, for over a century. Following closure of the mines in the 1980s, the town then fell into disrepair, and has only latterly been rejuvenated through tourism, winter sports and some nice spin-offs from the Winter Olympics.

Every year however, the town comes out in force to remember its mining heritage. The annual miners reunion brings ex-miners, their friends and families back to Canmore for a day of celebration marked by parades and festivities.

A lot of Canadians trace their roots back to Scotland, something that was apparent here in the music, and on the placards. The families of the miners all displayed their family names as they marched, which included plenty of  'Mc' and 'Mac' names as well as other Scottish names such as Wardrop. Later immigrants brought swathes of Polish and other Eastern European names to Canmore.

Reformation 500

The Christian and Secular media are both noting the fact that it is five hundred years since Martin Luther nailed up his 95 thesis against the sale of indulgences; which became a seminal moment in what ultimately became The Reformation. As well as talking about it a bit in a church on Sunday morning, I've been listening to a brilliant online lecture series by Dr Carl Trueman about all things Reformation. It's informative, alarming, sometimes funny, and Trueman turns about to be rather generous to his opponents; perhaps more so in person than in print! If you want to know what Luther was "the Jimi Hendrix of The Reformation", or why Zwingli was "The Doors of The Reformation", then look no further! The entire series is found here: https://faculty.wts.edu/lectures/lecture-01-the-reformation-with-dr-carl-trueman/  He doesn't even mention Led Zeppelin until the third lecture, which for Trueman is quite good going. 

In Johnston Canyon

At Lake Minnewanka

At The Canadian Badlands Passion Play

The Alberta town of Drumheller, is famous for three things; Dinosaurs, Star Trek, and The Canadian Badlands Passion Play. It was the last of these three things which drew us to that unusual little town this summer. 

The play is a dramatic and musical presentation of the life of Jesus, as portrayed in the Biblical gospels; set in an enormous outdoor amphitheatre. The vast set is divided into different areas, each representing the different settings of the well-known stories around 1st Century Palestine under Roman occupation. Bethlehem, Galilee, Nazareth, Herod's palace, The Temple, Pilate's quarters, and of course Calvary are all there. The hills behind the set are also brought into use, as angels appear and disappear. Portraying Herod in such comic terms was a surprising twist, and when Herod lapsed into Trump-speak, it was genuinely hilarious!

We were there on the opening night of the 2017 season. The actors looked very nervous as they began, and hesitated their way through a couple of opening scenes. Then as they reached the 'sermon the mount' scene, everything came together and the whole thing suddenly took off. It was at that point that I became unaware of the folks in the seats around me and was drawn right into the story. 

I should add that all these photos were taken before and after the performance and I did respect their "no-photography during the play" policy.

It was wonderful to see the gospel story given such a compelling and vivid dramatisation. The trial and crucifixion of Jesus was very moving, and extremely well done; the horror and violence of the event somewhat downplayed beneath its sheer significance; gripping for adults without unnecessarily disturbing the children. (No Mel Gibson direction!). The resurrection was in contrast somewhat understated.

Weirdly, all three cars in which our group drove to Drumheller from Rosebud had failures on our remote control keys, and couldn't open our car doors. A local wryly told me that there are strange radiation patterns around there, because all the aliens who land in Canada are stored in a secret military base just outside the town. It seems a but rough to lock them up, I assume they just want to visit the Star Trek museum.... 

Book Notes: Redeeming Sex by Debra Hirsch

Factions and divisions within the Christian Church used to be based around the content of their creeds and confessions. It is, after all, almost 500 years to the day since Martin Luther nailed up his famous "95 Theses", which started the Reformation in Europe. The early churches argued about Gnosticism, and Arianism, the Middle Ages saw the schisms over ecclessiology and soteriology. In more recent times, eschatology and pneumatology have been the bones of contention. All of these disputes seem to be managed with calmness today compared the bitter and acrimonious disputes about Christianity and Sex. It is a brave writer (or indeed reviewer), who dares to try to walk on such stormy waters. Debra Hirsch is one such courageous person.

Books in this field usually fall into one of thee categories, (1) conservative studies primarily of the biblical text. which seek to re-enforce traditional sexual mores; (2) radical theologies which seek to change traditional Christian teaching and endorse things such as Same-Sex Marriage by arguing either that a) the Bible has been misunderstood, or b) is not authoritative on the subject. The third type of book is the spiritual autobiography of a person who changed their mind and lifestyle on the issue, either from conservative to liberal, or from liberal to conservative. Thinkers as diverse as John Stott, Steve Chalke, Rosaria Butterfield, Rowan Williams, and Vicky Beeching fall into these categories.

Debra Hirsch's Redeeming Sex (IVP, 2015) is a far harder book to classify because it doesn't slot happily into any of the usual categories, but seems to draw on them all! This turns out to the be book's great strength, and also its weakness. Rather than plunging straightforwardly into the contentious 'gay issue', Hirsch tries to draw together a biblical and theological view of sexuality; as an essential part of humanity, as good, and as badly handled by the church. That's all pretty standard stuff; what is more intriguing is Hirsch's distinction between social and genital sexuality and the way in which she begins to weave her personal story, and those of friends and family, into the book.

The great distinctive of this book is this. Many more liberal books claim to respect the Bible and Christian teaching; but in fact undermine it. Many more conservative books claim to only uphold biblical teaching while loving and affirming people; but totally fail to do this in practise. Hirsch seems to plough a lonely furrow of walking with the Bible firmly embraced in one hand, and gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people in the other. She herself left the gay lifestyle behind when she became a Christian; but does not endorse sexuality re-orientation programmes which are discredited. Rather she talks about a process of re-awakening her own latent heterosexuality over time. She does, gently affirm that there is a tension between homo-erotic practice and biblical spirituality; but on the other-hand does not seek to make agreement with her point of view on this issue a requirement of joining her church. Rather she speaks about the grace of God bringing us to faith in Christ, requiring a lifetime of sanctification of all of our lives - progress being made faster in different areas, than others; all of us heading in the same direction at different speeds. She reiterates the often overlooked point that almost everyone is in some way sexually disordered, lustful, or selfish; and that we are all fellow-travellers in sanctification regardless of gender or orientation.

Essential to her working this out is her distinctive ecclessiology. She explores two models of church community which she refers to as (a) the bounded set and (b) the centred set. The bounded set describes a legalistic institution in which outward conformity to rules selected to make the group distinct are enforced. This is the old-style church. The centred set is a loose association of people, all of whom are centred on one defining source: in the case Jesus Christ. Everyone seeks to become more like Jesus, but accepts fellow-travellers who may not be positioned as closely to the centre as ourselves; but are nevertheless facing him, and being drawn towards him. Such an open model of church is maybe a missionally helpful one. and one in which biblical ideas can be shared gently, and sensitively over the long term. The old adage about loving sinners but hating sin might actually work in this model, and might apply to all sins, not just ones we have made into boundary markers!

The problem with the promotion of the Centred-Set model, is that while it might well look a bit like the band of disciples in the gospels, or the wider group around Jesus; it might not sit so comfortably alongside the epistles of the New Testament. The Pauline corpus is especially problematic for it, in a number of ways. Firstly. these epistles do seem to have some sense that the boundaries of the early church were to be established around some certain observable behavioural criteria (1Cor5), and that exclusion from the fellowship meal was a significant boundary marker and mode of church discipline. The New Testament looks at the very least, a little more of a bounded set than Hirsch seems to allow. Secondly, there are issues with her assertion that sexual morality is a secondary issues around which Christians can simply agree to disagree; and that sexual conduct should not have any influence on fellowship. However 1 Corinthians seems to be written partly in order to refute such thinking, making sexual ethics a primary issue; not a matter of lesser importance. It is certainly not in the 'new moons and sabbaths' category of issues on which differing views are permitted. Finally Hirsch is insistent that there is an element of hypocrisy in the bounded-set church which selects sexuality as a boundary issue, while allowing all manner of greed and gossipping in under the radar. Of course, she is absolutely right about that. I'm not sure though, that her proposed solution, of abolishing the boundaries is what the New Testament would recommend. It's hard not to see 1 Cor 5&6 as promoting boundaries especially in sexual matters; not because sexual sins are more offensive to God than greed (Jesus makes it clear that greed is utterly abhorrent) but because these relational sins are notably damaging; perhaps because as relational sins, they are most damaging to community. Incidentally Galatians indicates some doctrinal boundaries too - it's not all about sex.

What Hirsch has in her favour is that she is seriously trying to work out what it means to welcome all manner of people into God's kingdom, without judging, without prejudice and without any sense of wanting to control people. She really believes that Jesus loves all, welcomes all and what people need most is His transforming presence in their lives. She is wonderfully able to combine her obvious devotion to Christ, and love of the Bible. with her many gay, lesbian and transgender members of her family and church; with whom she shares her life. No-one could read either Debra Hirsch's biography, or pleas to the church to be inclusive; and then seriously argue that everyone who seeks to follow the Bible's moral code is a hate-filled homophobe. Hirsch is so positively pro-gay in so many ways that conservative readers will be shocked; while radical proponents of queer theory will probably never forgive her personal decision to leave the gay lifestyle for biblical reasons.

Redeeming Sex is a disturbing read, a new angle on a debate which too often has the two sides lining up against one another; determined to shout, never to listen. As I have mentioned, the strength of the book lies in its coupling of serious and genuine discipleship, with open gracious warm-hearted love for all, and in that it is inspiring. Where it maybe stumbles is in squaring its proposals with the practicalities of New Testament instructions about the shape of church life. Either way, this book requires serious consideration by Christians who long to find a way of maintaining biblical fidelity without engaging in some unedifying US style culture-war, with all the nasty "them" and "us" connotations for which the self-righteous Pharisees were so slammed by Jesus. These are complex, and sensitive areas to which Hirsch makes an important contribution. Perhaps finally, it is as much her attitude, as her arguments which are so important.

Across the Prairies to Rosebud

 Heading across the prairie-lands near Rosebud, Alberta late summer evening.

Target practice.

I'm not a big fan of guns, gun-ownership, and so forth, I'm SO European in that regard. I'm also not a big fan of simplistic answers to complex problems. Here in Canada, I was happy to join in the local culture, walk across the prairies, and shoot a gun for probably the first and last time in my life.The local culture is clearly a world away from the mass shootings which plague America. Rural gun ownership is again, another world from urban gun culture. Not sure I'd ever want to handle a weapon again, but it was an experience.

Prairie Sunset 

 Rosebud is a little world of charm - and delightful people, tucked away in rural Alberta. It's a tiny farming hamlet, with its own theatre, and theatre school.  we were taken there by some Canadian friends. When they suggested it, we were reluctant to venture away from the Rockies, to such flat country; but it turned out to be a real highlight.

 The busy main street: Rosebud

 In nearby Horseshoe Canyon

 Then off the Wild West.

Book Notes: Millions Like Us by Virginia Nicholson

Military history is a booming genre. Whether it is because of the ongoing centenary of the WWI battles, or because Britain is both Brexiting from its recent history and secularising away from its roots that a nostalgic search for identity is underway, I cannot say. I suspect that both processes are involved. I also suspect that WWII studies gain readers who are attracted to a period in history in which Britain was engaged in one of history's few genuinely 'just wars', as if there was any moral connection between the sacrifices of the 1940s and Britain of today. While I have read a little about wars, of battlefield experiences, conflicts, generals and the like; I am far more drawn to those few historians who examine the 'home-front' in war. It seems to me that battles, for all their horror and intensity; pass into history along with the fallen; but the effects of battles live on and are of more lasting significance. Perhaps too, such histories more closely relate to my experiences. I have spent time as an at-home parent, raising children - I have never been in the armed forces. Virginia Nicholson is a first-rate war-historian who writes about the social consequences of war. Her former book, "Singled Out" dealt with the effect of the loss of so many men of one generation on the women of the WWI era. (My review of this title was published in Solas Magazine) 'Millions Like Us' is Nicholson's follow-on book, exploring the lives of British women as they entered WWII, engaged in it, were changed by the experience and how this affected them in the post-war era.

In traditional WWII books, the central narrative is of the progress of the war, from Appeasement through to VE Day, with landmarks such as Pearl Harbour and D-Day lining the route. The themes are then occasionally illustrated with individual anecdotes. Nicholson rather deftly reverses this norm, basing the book around the lives of women as they experience conflict and its effects. That is not to say that the progress of the war itself is not here - it it, but the ongoing fortunes of The Allies is the backdrop to individual women's stories. Many of these unfolding personal dramas are very moving, many compelling, and all rather insightful as they explore the departure of sons and husbands, rationing, austerity, bombing, bereavement and of course, the drafting of millions of women into the non-combatant elements of the war effort. 

It was in the vivid descriptions of the difficulties faced on the home-front that I imagined - perhaps more profoundly than ever, what my two Grandmothers must have experienced. One in the North of England, with three small children living through the bltiz; and the other first serving in the WAAF, and then having a child, then being evacuated from the city. Although none of the life-stories in the book were of people who in themselves were much like either of my two grandmothers, there was enough of the life, times, values, and struggles of the period here for me to be able to picture them in it, which was actually rather sobering. To read such things and realise that it was so comparatively recent, is hard to comprehend.

Nicholson's stories of women's lives are taken from a wealth of research from diarists, official sources, post-war memoirs, and an array of interviews she conducted with elderly women who remembered the era. Yet this weight of data is presented in lively prose which is accessible and highly readable.

Along with mere survival, and the background story of the war itself, Nicholson guides the reader through an exploration of how the women of that generation faced alarming challenges and in the words of so many of them, "just got on with it..... you had to". The title, "Millions Like Us", was initially a 1940s public information film about the struggles on the home front, but is used by Nicholson to indicate that the stories she presents are not the exceptions but the norm. In the book we discover how women understood their role, understood femininity, and how family life was structured. We learn about the practicalities of family life, in Britain emerging from the depressed 30s, and how women felt about courtship, marriage, romance, sex, children, work, leisure and belief. Critically, we are guided through the process by which so many of their assumptions and values were challenged, as they negotiated the difficulties of war, and the very different problems of peace. Of course, many women had worked outside the home for the fist time, and were unwilling to retreat into their domestic limitations after their menfolk were demobbed. The home-front was in many ways a highly feminised environment. Here the oft-noted effect of war to promote social change, to fight not just a distant enemy but for a better future at home, laid some of the first seeds of feminism. Conversely the all-male fighting units of the British Army, who fought, and suffered together, seemed to have done so motivated (at least in part), to protect their women and children; and expected to come back to a heroes-welcome and domestic coronation. Unsurprisingly for many of Nicholson's women, 1946 was a stressful year.

Military history is a booming genre. If you habitually read about Montgomery, of D-day and of Stalingrad; make sure you balance that by reading something like Nicholson, and see into the other side of the conflict as it unfolded at home.

Beautiful Bow Lake

My habit of posting photos long after I have been back at home is obviously confusing some people, who ask me to call in and see them, when they see I have posted a photo from their part of the world. The excuse is that my camera takes CR2 (Canon RAW) files which aren't useful anywhere except on my computer, so I take them home, chose the best and convert them to jpegs for posting. This isn't a long process, but having the time to go through and pick the best mages can be a bit laborious. So for the record, I am no longer in the Rockies, but back home in Scotland, editing and posting images!

These are of glorious Bow Lake. Clicking on the images to enlarge them does a bit to add to the sense of size, scale and beauty; but obviously capture only a fraction of what it is to be there. We only spent an afternoon, overnight and morning here - but our while family cited it as one of the places we'd love to go back to; to walk the trail round the lake towards the distant waterfall through wild bear country!

Driving the Icefields Parkway

The Icefields Parkway is a rightly celebrated drive along Canada Rocky Mountains. Mile after mile after mile of amazing scenery unfolds between Jasper and Banff in what is an overload for the eyes, and the imagination. I'd absolutely love to go back and cycle it, despite some of the significant ascents along its length. Top photo is taken through the car window....